Since the FIFA Worldcup is going on, this is the best time to spread the malwares. So the malware coders might have been working on very hard for this time. So its you guys who should be worried about.
If you are careful about a few things, you don’t have to worry about anything!
1. Everyone will be trying to watch the online streaming videos for WORLDCUP. But searching these things might cause you to reach the wrong page and it will be the last thing you will ever want. Some websites will be loaded with lots of malwares while some other will be loaded with porn. In both cases it could cause problems for you, especially if you are at work.
So if you reach some pages and it is asking you to download and install any missing codec, don’t download it. Don’t accept any files from that website. Most probably it will be some kind of trojan.
2. Now one other the most effective threat is by using emails. If you are getting any emails saying Worldcup updates or something similar to that, don’t download the attachment. It may be a PDF file. But it may have stuffed with some bad code, which can probably install some kind of trojan in your system.
Technology is getting improved day by day. The reasons for us to use computers are getting more and more. All this is the good part. Now comes the bad part, Viruses and other Malwares. BlackHats are making hell lot of money just by these malwares. But these malwares use layman’s computers for making this happen. As of now if you just leave your computer online without any firewalls or antivirus softwares, it is said that, it will get infected in just 10 mins.
With the plethora of viruses, bugs, worms and threats invading the desktop these days, antivirus products have become a critical tool for any PC user. Again there are lots of Antivirus softwares for you to choose. Each one is having its own advantages and disadvantages.
And let me tell you at first only. There are Rogue AntiVirus softwares, which may disguise you .
Wikipedia says,
Rogue security software is a form of computer malware that deceives or misleads users into paying for the fake or simulated removal of malware. Rogue security software, in recent years, has become a growing and serious security threat in desktop computing.
So just don’t fall for this.
Now let me come to the Comparison of Top 5 AntiVirus softwares.
Nod32 Antivirus promises you fast, effective and easy-to-use protection. The system wil not slow down a little bit because of NOD32 and yet it is quite powerful. Almost all emerging threats are detectable by NOD32. The database updates are very frequent offering one of the best real time protection even from the latest malwares. The user interface is quite good. The UI very easy to eyes. It has 2 profiles for both advanced PC users and normal PC users. But still the user configurable options are less compared to some other Antivirus. For some users this may be a disadvantage. But still I can sya it is good for its simplicity.
Key Benefits
Keeps you safe from viruses, spyware, trojans, password stealers and other malware threats
Stops most new threats proactively, well before other vendors have issued a signature, maximizing your defense against new and unknown threats
Scans and cleans Internet traffic and email, even when it’s SSL-encrypted, so your email is always safe
Stops threats from entering through removable devices so you can share files with confidence
Integrated SysInspector and SysRescue simplify system diagnosis and recovery
Self defense prevents malware from degrading your level of protection
Tiny signature updates happen discretely as needed and won’t bog down your system
Free technical support via the Web, email or phone
Avast is famous for their Home Free version. They offers an unmatched protection from viruses free. This free version is only for Home users. FREE avast! antivirus Home Edition includes ANTI-SPYWARE protection, certified by the West Coast Labs Checkmark process, and ANTI-ROOTKIT detection based on the best-in class GMER technology even with No additional purchase.Avast has a skinnable user interface. The gallery for this skins contain awesome skins. If you haven’t tried avast till now, I will tell you to try it atleast once. Anyway avast detection for Script files is somewhat bad for Home edition.
Then one best part of avast is the BootTime Scan. It helps you to remove viruses at the boot time. This helps to remove the viruses which are very difficult to remove when windows is working. Another thing about avast is its disinfection capability. Its just awesome. If you are disinfecting with avast, a corrupt file hardly happens.
Overall the best detection rate, Frequent database updates, Good detection of potentially unwanted and dangerous applications, Good self defense, etc etc The good parts of Kaspersky antivirus is incomparable with many of its competitors. As far as I know the only bad part of Kaspersky is, its usage of system resources is a little bit more, and this may make your system a little bit slow.
Real-time scanning of files, web pages and e-messages
Basic identity theft protection Improved!
Color-coding of links to unsafe websites New!
Disabling of links to malicious websites
Blocking of suspicious programs based on their behavior Improved!
Protection from hijacking of your PC
Self-protection from malware
Regular and emergency updates for always-on protection
BitDefender Antivirus 2010 provides advanced proactive protection against viruses, spyware, phishing attacks and identity theft, without slowing down your PC. Bitdefender is one of the most stable Antivirus Software. Whatever happens to the system, this application runs like a charm. And this helps to recover from any bad conditions. Besides this, the software is just a usual antivirus application.
Features and Benefits
Confidently download, share and open files from friends, family, co-workers – and even total strangers
Protects against viruses and other malware using industry-leading technology
Scans all Web, e-mail and instant messaging traffic in real-time
Provides an unmatched detection rate of new threats based on two different proactive technologies
Blocks spyware programs that track your online activities
Protect your identity: shop, bank, listen and watch, privately and securely
Blocks web pages that attempt to steal your credit card data
Prevents personal information from leaking via e-mail, Web or instant messaging
Guard your conversations with top-of-the line encryption
Instant Messaging Encryption keeps your conversations private on Yahoo! and MSN Messenger
Play safely, play seamlessly
Reduces the system load and avoids requesting user interaction during game play
Get fine-tuned performance from your computer
Optimized scanning technology skips safe files for better scan speed and lower system load
Laptop Mode prolongs battery life
Let professionals solve any security issues
Assistance with common issues built directly into the product
Free technical support for the entire duration of the product license
Avira AntiVir Personal – FREE Antivirus is a reliable free antivirus solution, that constantly and rapidly scans your computer for malicious programs such as viruses, Trojans, backdoor programs, hoaxes, worms, dialers etc. Monitors every action executed by the user or the operating system and reacts promptly when a malicious program is detected.Avira AntiVir Personal is a comprehensive, easy to use antivirus program, designed to offer reliable free of charge virus protection to home-users, for personal use only.
Features
AntiVir protection against viruses, worms and Trojans
AntiDialer protection against expensive dialers
AntiRootkit protection against hidden rootkits
Faster Scanning up to 20% faster
New User Interface
AntiPhishing protection against phishing
AntiSpyware protection against spyware and adware
NetbookSupport for laptops with low resolution
Now thats all for now. So select a good antivirus, and install. By the way, if you think some oether antivirus should come in this list, put it as comment. Give your reviews also.
lots and lots of websites are being infected by this method. The result is, your user systems will produce strange behaviors as the attacker wants it. Only php installed web servers seem to have this problem. Since almost all of the webservers have PHP installed all of you must be carefull. Make sure any CMS you are using are updated to the latest version including all the plugins. By CMS i meant applications like Joomla, Drupal etc etc. The one i came across with is, “wedding.php”. Less number of anti-viruses are detecting it.
Information and details of the infection about similar kinds of malware.
Its pretty much easy if you keep a few things in mind while using computers. Ok let me say, these few things are just the beginning. A full proof technique for not getting hacked, is to be a hacker itself. And guess what thats not an easy task.
Anyway here i will try my level best to give guidelines and tips for computer safety.
So let me start with some points first (I’ll explain each of them):
1. Do not download any executable files from websites which you dont know.
2.Do not install any unrequired toolbars for your browser.
3. Do not download pirated software of software patches.
4.Do not download pirated audio or video.
5.Always keep all your softwares updated.
6.Type in using virtual keyboards if you can; especially if you are logging in to banking websites.
7.Do not log in to any websites just by going through a link, just type the website name in the address bar and then login.
8.Dont give out too much info about you in any Social communities.
9.Always include atleast one special symbol in passwords.
10.Use noScript Addon with Firefox for a safer Browsing.
So now let me explain each one of them:
1. Do not download any executable files from websites which you dont know.
Executable means any files with extension with “.exe”. These types of files can change almost anything in your computer. and most of the viruses and other malwares will have this extension. By default in windows we cannot see the extension. So some viruses and worms are making use of this.
For example most of the autorun worm(which are most common which can be traversed by the help of USB drives, will have icon of the folder. But since the extension will not be displayed most users will double click on that to see whats inside. Thats the end of a uninfected system. With in a few hours the whole system will be badly infected.
So for your safety enable it. You can enable it by going to “folder options” in Control Panel. Then goto View tab n Remove check mark from Hide extensions for Known filetypes.
You can use the McAfee site advisor to know whether the site is a malware supplier. But still we cannot just rely on this. Also if you are so keen on downloading files from an unknown website, then after downloading you may consider uploading the file to VIRUSTOTAL.COM for checking whether the file sis infected or not. This services scans the file using around 40 uptodate antiviruses.
Autorun worm being a major n higly risky threat i have included one solution for this also.
See this video to know how to protect your USB Drives from Autorun Worms.
2.Do not install any unrequired toolbars for your browser.
Toolbars can never be trusted. Its ok to install them if you trust the provider. But still its risky. They can get all the information your doing using a browser if a tool bar is installed. the risk of using this out shines all other advantages. theres been reports that even one of the major supplier of Operating system spies us.
3. Do not download pirated software of software patches.
Dont think that all of the crackers and hackers are making the Cracked versions n Patches for the softwwares, just for fun. Its not like that in 99% cases. They are making money using this. And how? They are using these cracks or patches for this. Some include undetectable keyloggers, ircBots, etc etc, in ther releases. So theres chances like you will lose more money than that will cost you if you just bought the software. So never download cracks or Patches. I’m not saying that all of them will be infected. But chances are there.
4.Do not download pirated audio or video.
Just like the executables never ever trust the videos or audios that your are downloading. I will explain why i’m telling this. One of my friend downloaded a mp3 song from a major file sharing network. Yeah he checked the extension, n it was .mp3. And then he doubleclicked on the file, it opened Windows Media Player, upto now everything worked normal, But after this itb asked him to download another codec, which is needed to play this file. So as he never installed any codecs in his system, he downloaded and installed the codec. afetr the installation the Antivirus told him that one of his system file is infected and cannot be desinfected. And guess what he had to reinstall the OS. So this explains everything right. This can happen even if you are viewing a video online. Thats why I said never download anything from untrusted sites.
5.Always keep all your softwares updated.
Aah this also I will explain suing an example event. . Ok, my friend was seraching for some tutorial about some hacking procedure. So he got one website which showed that they have this file but in PDF format. so he didnt double checked it as he had Adobe Reader installed in his system. So he downloaded it and opened it. first the file didnt open . So he tried agian , after some time it opened. But it was having some random texts which had no relation to what he was looking for. But then he noticed another thing, his computer became quite slow. then he opened up his process explorer n found that some files are being run which he didnt recognize. He took a copy of the file and tried uploading to the virustotal.com and found that the file is infected.
So even pdf files can download malwares and execute them without much further user interaction. But as a matter of fact if you are updated with the latest updates provided by these software vendors, this might not happen. As they will release security bulletins for protecting users from these kind exploits.
So be updated with the softwares you are using. And btw you will not get updates in almost all cases if you are using pirated versions.
6.Type in using virtual keyboards if you can; especially if you are logging in to banking websites.
You never know what will be in there in the system you are using. Keyloggers,bots, Remote Admin tools, etc etc. So if you are logging into some serious websites(by serious i meant which can play crucial role in your life, (of course banking websites are included in this ) use virtual Keyboards. In windows Systems Its there in start-> all Programs->Accessories->accesibility->onscreen Keyboard.
The advantage of this is, most of the keyloggers can only detect the key pressed if the hardware keyboard is used. They cannot detect the keys being pressed in virtual Keyboard. But i’m not saying that the other is not possible. But still its safer to use this.
7.Do not log in to any websites just by going through a link, just type the website name in the address bar and then login.
The most simple way of hacking to get username and password is PHISHING. Its so simple that if you have the correct tools for this or , a little bit knowledge in PHP you can make a phishing page. But the real thing int his hacking procedure it to make the users click on their link on which they have uploaded their phishing page.
So they will their social engg skills for this. One example for this is, sending an email telling, your account is about to be deleted because of inactivity. If you ahve any doubts regarding this please login in the following link and post a query about this. <the link to their PHishing Page>
So if you click and login there you username and password is sent to the owner of the particular phishing page. IF you are getting any mails asking you to login jsut type in the web address in the browser, then use the search function to check if the mail you got is legitimate . If not so please report to the original website admin about thias so that they can take actions on this Phisher.
Also never ever share the password and user accounts with 2 different domains unless you have enough info about both the websites. For example You have the facebook profile. And while browsing through someones profile you are seeing like Login here to See FaceBook Especially for Guys interested in Girls. So it may not what you might be thinking. Those will be a links to other phishing pages.
8.Dont give out too much info about you in any Social communities.
Hackers have social engineering Skills. More often they will have better social engineering skills. So if you are unsure about a guys or never have seen him/her in real life, never give away too much information about yourself. This can help them to figure out your password, Security Question, etc etc. So keep this in mind always.
9.Always include atleast one special symbol in passwords.
Nowadays its becoming more n more difficult for the hackers. Since almost all of the websites have captcha installed @ the login page the brute Force attack and Dictionary attack have become almost impossible to do. But still its a good idea to include a special Symbol in your password.(spl symbols like !,@,#,$,%,^,&,*,(,),_,+). Doing so will greatly enhance the security of your password. Dictionary will not be feasible if you have included these symbols. And Brute Force Attacking will be the dumbest thing if you have included this spl symbol. And also try to increase the length of your password as much as you can.
10.Use noScript Addon with Firefox for a safer Browsing.
Using Javascript attacker can redirect you from legitimate websites to the website they want you to go, or make you download something which will require no user interaction.
So using this Addon will disable javascript. You can simply install this and enable if you are unsure about a website.
So thats it. I hope you enjoyed reading this and will keep all these thing while you are on computer. Also if you liked this please pass it on. Let your friends also feel safe..
A scareware package is on the wild which mimics Windows’ infamous Blue Screen of Death for scaring people and to mislead them to buy some crappy (rogue) anti spyware application.
If you ever came across this kind of screen in which some notice like “your system is infected” is there, dont be scared. Their purpose is to scare you and make you pay for some crap.
The Blue Screen of Death trick is a new social engineering innovation used by the developers of these rogue applications. If you buy their product assuming it would clean your system and make your system safe, then you are wrong. This family of software isn’t necessarily intrinsically malicious, but members of the family often use deceptive sales techniques and false positives, deliberate or accidental, to convince users to pay for a license.
So dont buy any products like this. Use some reputed anti virus product for removing their trails from your system.
Note:
If you are one among the people who used to watch online videos frequently, especially the videos which are illegal to watch, then stop or atleast be careful. Because nowadays malwares are spreading using a new technique. For example you will be asked to download and install some new codec or player for viewing their content. If you download and install this, you will end up with a severely infected system.
Currently the malwares are being spread by various means. The attackers are using their social engineering skills to make the victim’s computers compromised. The bad fact is that these people have a very high level of social engineering skills.
Also the people who uses internet and computers with the lack of good knowledge about computers and internet makes it easy for the attackers to infect the computer they are using.
“Erin Andrews Nude Video Scandal” this is a hot discussion topics on lots of discussion boards and chat rooms. The black hats also used this to popularize their malwares. There have been lots of websites offering the video for this. But trust me, Almost 80% of these websites were hosting malwares and they tried to infect the people who visited their websites for watching this video.
So what these hackers did was, they just asked the visitor to download a required codecpack/player to play this special kind of video. If the visitor does not have a good computer background s/he will click on it . Then the download prompt will display. Guess what, Now the visitor became the victim because of the malware just now s/he downloaded. This malware can be used by the hacker to gain full or partial control of the victim through the internet. Thus the victims system can be used even as a webserver by the attacker if s/he wanted to.
So first principle not to get infetced is, being aware of these kind of threats. Always “Prevention is better than cure”.
Now you may say, i ‘ll be more careful now-onwards but what if i already got infected?.
Then let me say, there are lots of resources for you. Like theres always been this opposite energy, for all these bad people who tries to fill this world with their malwares, there are Good people who tries to help all those victims of these attackers. They try very hard for keeping this world safe.
Now let me come to the point why i made this post.
There are lots of forums a.k.a. BBS a.k.a. discussion boards which offers to help you for disinfecting/cleaning your systems. And once your system got cleaned they will provide you guidelines for not to get infected again in future.
These are the lists of those kind of forums i’m aware of:
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. Ok, my friend was seraching for some tutorial about some hacking procedure. So he got one website which showed that they have this file but in PDF format. so he didnt double checked it as he had Adobe Reader installed in his system. So he downloaded it and opened it. first the file didnt open . So he tried agian , after some time it opened. But it was having some random texts which had no relation to what he was looking for. But then he noticed another thing, his computer became quite slow. then he opened up his process explorer n found that some files are being run which he didnt recognize. He took a copy of the file and tried uploading to the virustotal.com and found that the file is infected.
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